


These troublesome disguises

by Tamburlaine_the_great



Category: The Marlows - Antonia Forest
Genre: Apologies, Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-28
Updated: 2020-05-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:54:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24421621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tamburlaine_the_great/pseuds/Tamburlaine_the_great
Summary: Patrick Merrick has come to a necessary realisation.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 16





	These troublesome disguises

They turned Mr Buster loose in the orchard and went on to the stable-yard, where Patrick stabled Blackleg and Nicola put away Buster’s tack, inhaling with pleasure the familiar scent of leather and saddle soap. They went on up to the house, riding boots clattering on the stone steps, and made their way to the kitchen. It was too early for tea, and the kitchen was quiet, so Patrick grabbed a couple of plates and loaded them with leftovers from Christmas dinner, and several more mince pies than even Nicola thought she’d be able to eat, and directed Nicola to collect a couple of mugs from the dresser. Nicola held open doors as they went back into the late afternoon sunlight, then into the rather dimmer space of the hawk house.

Patrick was aware that he was putting off to some theoretically ideal moment the words he’d reluctantly, steeling himself to it, decided he had to speak. Even if Nicola hadn’t known, his conscience, pricked more insistently since the Great Telephone Row by his realisation that he’d had no right to pretend with someone else’s feelings, had demanded that he do so.

There was a kettle and a portable gas ring of the camping variety, on which he proposed to make tea. They started eating while the water was boiling, Nicola expressing appreciation of the different flavours of a Merrick meal compared to a Mrs Bertie special, and the frankly delicious mince pies. Patrick grinned and said, “I’ll tell Nellie you said so.”

“I’m not sure that they’re not better than Mrs Bertie’s, actually,” she replied, licking pastry crumbs from her fingers. “My efforts in Dom Sci are pathetic in comparison.”

“That’s one thing that even my last lot didn’t attempt to teach. Boys, evidently, not needing to learn.”

“ _Can_ you cook?”

He shook his head. “Toast and scrambled egg is about the limit of my culinary talent.” He slipped into the small side room and returned a few minutes later with steaming mugs of tea. “Sorry there’s no milk, but I’ve put in a lot of sugar.”

Nicola looked doubtfully at the brew: tea, in her opinion, was only drinkable if drowned in plenty of milk and sweetened with at least two lumps of sugar. She blew on it, sipped experimentally, and discovered that with enough sugar almost anything was palatable. Something came into her head that she’d meant to ask earlier: “Does your mother ever hunt? You said once that she’d been coveting Chocbar before Mum bought her.”

“She does hunt. I don’t know that she actually enjoys the getting up at the crack-of and freezing to death parts, though. Not that she’d tell me, natch.” He paused, realising she had given him no better opening, before he went on with an effort, colouring deeply, “Look, Nick, I’m sorry for almost jumping on you, last year. I wasn’t thinking at all, and I’m glad you weren’t hurt.”

Now almost equally discomfited, and trying not to be, she muttered that it was quite alright but she’d return the favour if he wasn’t careful.

“ _And_ ,” he said, emphatically, “now that we’re both thoroughly embarrassed, can I ask you something that I’ve been meaning to for ages? Last summer holidays, were you _always_ out doing other things when I suggested hawking? Or have you gone off it? It’s just – Gin said – and I’ve been thinking since the phoning huha that maybe I shouldn’t have taken everything she said as gospel.” It was dark enough now that she could only just make out his expression.

 _Crikey_ , Nicola thought, _how was one supposed to answer that?_ “I didn’t want to barge in if I wasn’t wanted,” she said, carefully.

“Oh,” he said, sounding thoroughly disconcerted. There was a long silence, and the darkness gradually rose and enveloped them. “I _knew_ I should have asked you. I’m sorry, Nick. I never meant that.” He sounded annoyed, though not, she thought, with anyone but himself. “ _Are_ you still interested in hawking?” he asked, tentatively, sounding more unsure of her reply than he had done in ages.

“Yes, of _course_ ,” she said, almost offended that he thought her such a flibbertigibbet: surely he knew her better than that. “When I get enthusiasms I generally keep them, you know.” Suddenly she wondered whether that might be altogether more than she was comfortable letting Patrick know.

He thought about this, Nicola’s steadfast fidelity to her obsessions – her loves, he amended and was again ashamed that he’d placed her, however briefly, in the same place in his mind as her elder sister. He was beginning to come to an aghast, shuddering realisation, that maybe he’d never really paid attention to Ginty, not properly: had seen only that beautiful, eager exterior: had never been interested enough in her thoughts to want to really know how she ticked: had in fact committed the sheet-kicking fatuity of just assuming she was like Nicola. And that was fair to neither of them.

“Would you like to come out tomorrow, in that case?” he asked. “I’ll – we’ll try her at a rook or two.”

“Yes,” she replied firmly, not pausing to analyse the warmth of pleasure spreading through her. “I’d like that.”

“Good. If you come over between ten and half-past you can pick up Buster and we can have sandwiches on the Crowlands and not have to dash back.”

Nicola grinned, unable to stop her mouth curling up at the thought of it, hoped it wouldn’t be too wet to forbid flying. “Good. I haven’t seen Regina fly since you got her back.” She hadn’t meant the comment as a rebuke, but Patrick flushed again, violently glad that the darkness in the hawk-house meant that she was unlikely to see. With that realisation came the thought that maybe it was daft of them to be sitting in the dark – and he should know it was easier to confess in shrouded twilight – gentle sister Night washing incessantly this soiled sinner. He rose to his feet, carefully stepped over the pale blurs which were the clean plates, and switched on the electric light with its two dim bulbs. They were each no more than forty watts, but it felt like being bathed in searchlight.

Nicola blinked. “Gosh. How late is it?”

Patrick glanced at his watch, and sighed. “I really must get this mended. It’s always stopping. It is not three minutes past two.”

“I should go.”

Patrick nodded, stooped to collect plates and mugs, bade farewell at the gate, and found himself watching Nicola stride down the path, wave to Buster in the orchard, until she was swallowed up in the gloom. He left the crocks in the scullery, hastily dodged out of Nellie’s way before she could scold him to get out of her nice clean kitchen, and returned to the hawk house to ensure Regina was happy and ready to sleep. He switched off the lights and closed the doors carefully, slipped into the house avoiding his relatives, and once in his bedroom, pulled off his boots and hacking jacket, and flopped down on the bed. A great relief, that he had not expected, engulfed him.

**Author's Note:**

> Missing scene from _Run Away Home_. Takes place immediately after the Boxing Day meet where Nicola and Patrick have a long talk after leaving the hunt early.  
> Title from _Paradise Lost_.  
> Patrick is misquoting Walt Whitman.


End file.
